Institution: Johns Hopkins University
Program: Department of Cognitive Science
Dissertation Status: Completed
Degree Date: 2002
Author: Matt Goldrick
Dissertation Title:
Patterns in sound, patterns in mind: Phonological regularities in
speech production
Dissertation URL: http://www.cog.brown.edu/~goldrick
Linguistic Field: Psycholinguistics, Phonology
Dissertation Director 1: Brenda Rapp
Dissertation Director 2: Paul Smolensky
Dissertation Abstract:
Linguistic research has documented a wide range of regularities in
phonological structure. Within languages, certain sound combinations
are ill-formed, never appearing in words of the language; across
languages, certain phonological structures are preferred to others.
Less well understood are the types of regularities that are encoded by
the spoken production system. To explore this question, section 1
describes three theories regarding the types of regularities that are
encoded. These theories are: one, the Instance-Based theory--gradient
regularities based on within-language token frequency of segmental and
supra-segmental structures are encoded; two, the Lexical Distribution
theory--gradient regularities based on within-language type frequency
of segmental and supra-segmental structures are encoded; and three,
the Markedness theory--categorical regularities based on
cross-linguistic and within-language markedness of sub-segmental,
segmental, and supra-segmental structures are encoded.
Building on previous research, a framework for spoken production
processing is described in section 2. The three theories are situated
within this general framework. Section 3 then reviews previous
research regarding the types of regularities that are encoded. These
studies suggest that categorical within-language phonological
regularities are encoded by the spoken production system, but fail to
distinguish between the three theories.
Section 4 reports the results of two experimental studies designed to
contrast the predictions of the three theories. These two experiments
are the first to demonstrate that sub-segmental regularities must be
encoded by the spoken production system. Experiment 1 uses an
implicit learning paradigm. As predicted by the Markedness theory,
participants in this experiment are sensitive to sub-segmental
regularities. Furthermore, gradient regularities are encoded,
supporting the predictions of the Instance-Based and Lexical
Distribution theories. Experiment 2 examines biases in speech errors.
The biases conform to the regularities of the Markedness theory, but
exhibit gradient effects. These results support a theory
incorporating elements of all three theories (i.e., gradient as well
sub-segmental regularities are encoded).
Section 5 discusses the implications of the results presented in
section 2, 3, and 4 for the computational mechanisms implementing
phonological processing. Future work to extend this research is
outlined, including an extension to existing computational theories
that may account for the full range of results.